This Is What Beyoncé Texted Channing Tatum After His 'Lip Sync Battle' Performance

It's a story that's truly remarkable: When Channing Tatum was joined by Beyoncé on stage during his viral "Run the World (Girls)" Lip Sync Battle performance, the two were actually just meeting for the first time. And Tatum never dreamt the whole thing would happen, he told Ellen DeGeneres on her show this week. "I won't even tell you what I had to do to essentially get her assistant's phone number or text her—I was texting her. I didn't even have the intention of her coming. It was a whole ploy to get permission to do something cause I had gotten through the grapevine that [my wife] Jenna was gonna bring out Paula [Abdul for her number], and I was like 'Hmm, who can I bring out, I know Beyoncé's not gonna come,' so I wanted to bring like a cardboard cutout of Beyoncé out just to be funny and then ultimately I ended up having to meet Beyoncé doing Beyoncé and that was definitely the most terrifying thing I've ever done."

Beyoncé did leave immediately after the performance, Tatum confirmed, but not without saying one thing to him. "I said 'hi' and she goes, 'Hey, that was really funny. See ya'" But she did text afterwards, and she was like, 'Hey I would love to meet you guys and hang out when you're not looking like me and so terrifying.'"

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As Tatum puts it, "She's like [The Usual Suspects'] Keyser Söze. I don't know if you guys know who that is but you know she exists, and like, but you never see her until all the sudden you're just like it happened, wait that was her, right? And then you always know she's somewhere in the world that can reach out and touch you."